


A Day at the Fair

by Sermocinare



Category: Watchmen - All Media Types
Genre: Crack, Fun, Humor, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-17
Updated: 2011-04-17
Packaged: 2017-10-18 06:09:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,760
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/185836
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sermocinare/pseuds/Sermocinare
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Crimebusters spend a day at the fun fair/carnival, with cotton candy, plushies and the tunnel of love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Day at the Fair

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Watchmen kinkmeme

They had been walking around the fun fair for almost half an hour now, and still hadn't found anything his partner was interested in. Dan was beginning to get more and more exasperated, secretly doubting that this outing, this "community building exercise", as Adrian had called it with that annoying smirk of his, had been a good plan after all. But he could hardly say so, seeing how it had been his idea.

"How about the shooting gallery, then, huh?" Dan's formerly bright smile was beginning to cramp as he pointed in the direction of the small booth, at which some teenage boys were trying to win some brightly colored, oversized plushies for the girls that were standing in a small, giggling cluster behind them.

"Probably rigged." Rorschach said, his tone flat, the blots on his mask moving sluggishly, almost as if they, too, were bored. Of course, Rorschach had had to keep on his mask even when everyone else was in civvies. "Also, guns are not a toy. Dangerous."

Daniel let out a long-suffering sigh, trying his best to suppress the urge to snap at his partner: "The games are rigged, the rides too fast and unsafe, and the shows are immoral. Seriously, Rorschach, isn't there anything you think is fun at this fun fair?"

"Hurm." Rorschach simply shrugged, his hands buried deep inside the pockets of his trench coat. How he managed to not simply melt into a puddle of sweat on this blistering July day was anybody's guess.

“You know what, I need a cold drink,” Dan said, changing the subject. Somehow, just thinking about Rorschach tugged away in his coat and scarf was making him thirsty. Spotting a stall that advertised “Ice Cold Drinks”, Dan headed over in that direction, the idea of an iced coke or a slushie bringing a smile to his face.

Looking at the list of drinks that was tacked to the brightly painted wall of the snacks stall, Dan rubbed the sweat from the back of his neck: “You want anything? It’s on me.” Remembering his partner’s habit of munching down on sugar cubes, Dan added: “How about some cotton candy?”

“Not sure,” Rorschach answered, tilting his head to the side in a gesture of curiosity, “never had any.”

“What?” Dan turned towards Rorschach, aghast. “You never had cotton candy? Not even as a kid?”

Rorschach gave a small shrug, and from the way his shoulders were sagging, Dan had the strange notion that his partner was actually ashamed about this.

“Well, then you need to try it right now. You’ll like it. You’ll see!” With a bright smile, Dan turned towards the young man behind the stall’s counter, and bought a slushie for himself, and a huge stick of cotton candy for Rorschach.

Handing the candy over to the masked man, Dan had trouble concealing a grin. There was so much cotton candy, Rorschach’s head pretty much vanished behind a cloud of pink fluff.

“How do I eat it?” Rorschach was looking at the cotton candy, the blots on his mask contracting into something like a confused frown.

“Easy,” Dan said, plucking at the sugary mass with two fingers, “you just pinch some off and then put it in your mouth.” Smiling, he did just that, relishing the flood of sweetness hitting his taste buds. Yes, this was what a fun fair tasted like.

Pushing up his mask over his nose, Rorschach experimentally pinched a few strands off the mountain of candy, sniffing at them suspiciously before pushing them into his mouth. Then, the corners of the vigilante’s mouth twitched upwards: “Good. Thank you, Daniel.”

Dan grinned: “You’re welcome, buddy.”

\---

“He cheated!” The face of the owner of the ring toss was quickly turning red. But then, given his girth, he probably had high blood pressure anyway. Also, Laurie concluded, he was an asshole. “He did something to the rings!”

She had just wanted to have some fun. Stroll over the fair, her arm around Jon’s, and let the sunshine warm her face and the breeze play with her hair. She had been cooped up in that military facility for too long. She felt like a prisoner there. And then she’d seen the adorable plush puppy that was the main prize of the ring toss, and, in a fit of girlish enthusiasm, asked Jon if he would win it for her. And now this.

“Listen, Mister,” she said, raising her chin, her eyes glittering, “if you have a problem with my boyfriend, I suggest you hash it out with him. Besides, Jon didn’t cheat.” Turning to the large blue man at her side, she smirked up at him: “Right?”

Jon’s voice was calm and impassive, the usual island in the stormy sea of human emotions raging around him: “Actually, the man is right. I did change the structure of the rings. Seeing how it would have been impossible to fit them over the pegs in their original state, I decided to make the game a little less one-sided.”

“Are you accusing me of cheating my customers?! Me?!?” The voice of the red-faced man was rising with every word. “Besides, less one-sided my ass. You’re the goddamn superman! It was kindness on my part to even let you play! Because I like your young lady here!”

Laurie scowled at the man for his attempt to pull her into this whole thing again, but before she could say something, Jon was speaking again: “I only adjusted the size of the rings. Everything else is simple mathematics. There is no need for superhuman ability in this game, provided the outset is fair. Which it was not.”

“Oh yeah? Well, if it’s so damn easy and don’t need any cheatin’, how about you let the normal people play?”

That did it. If there was one thing Laurie couldn’t stand, it was people insinuating that Jon was a freak. Grabbing the rings Jon had tossed, she pulled them free of the stall owner’s fingers, snarling at him: “Then get your fat ass out of the way, and I’ll show you how it’s done.”

Before any of the men could react, Laurie had tossed all three rings over the pegs. With an almost predatory grin, she turned to the stall’s owner, whose jaw had dropped so low it was almost touching the floor. “But… but…” the man stammered.

“I think I deserve a prize,” Laurie said, not even trying to hide the haughty tone in her voice.

Without saying another word, the man reached up and plucked a plush bear from its ledge above the pins, handing it over to Laurie, who tucked it underneath her left arm, her right arm slinking around Jon’s: “Come on. Let’s go get some candy.”

They had walked in silence for almost a minute before Jon raised his voice, his tone soft: “I am sorry.”

“Don’t be. It’s not your fault the guy was an asshole,” Laurie said, tossing back her hair.

“But you wanted a puppy. Now you have a bear.”

Laurie gave the plush animal a short glance, then shrugged: “Guess I’ll have to live with that. We don’t always get what we want.”

Jon stopped, and Laurie turned, looking at him. There was a curious expression on his face, something like nostalgia, and his deep, endless eyes were sparkling warmly.

“We don’t always,” he said. Then, he tilted his head and smiled at her: “But sometimes, we do.”

When Laurie looked at the plushie again, there was an adorable puppy dog face looking back at her, cloth tongue hanging out of its mouth. “Oh, Jon!”

Jon was still smiling, his fingers lightly brushing back her hair: “It has the same amount of molecules as the bear. And it seems to make you happy.”

\---

“Ooooh yeah,” Eddie drawled, grinning like the world’s most oversized and maladjusted ten-year-old. Which, at least to Adrian, he sometimes was. “Now that’s what I call a rollercoaster.”

The thing that had Eddie all giddy was a monstrosity made from wood and steel, with drops and turns that probably put a few G on its passengers. And, Adrian noted with a frown, safety measures that were completely inadequate to this kind of high-risk fun. Fittingly, the owners had named it “The Apocalypse”, proclaiming that “The End Is Nigh!” in big, dripping red letters on a wooden board hung up next to the front of the queue.

Stopping in his tracks, Adrian crossed his arms in front of his chest, proclaiming: “I think I’ll pass on this one.”

“What, and miss the fun?” Eddie grinned, and elbowed him in the ribs: “Come on. What are you, some kind of sissy boy?”

Raising a well-manicured eyebrow, Adrian looked down at Eddie: “Stooping to that level already, Edward?”

“If you call me Edward one more time, you goddamn nancy, I’m going to throw you in front of that thing,” Eddie growled, looking daggers at Adrian. Then, the challenging grin was back: “Don’t tell me the great and wonderful Ozymandias is afraid of a few loopings. Or are you worried that it will ruin your hair?” Looking from Adrian to the rollercoaster and back again, Eddie stepped a little closer to the blonde man, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial murmur: “Or maybe you just can’t stand not being in control of everything even for a few minutes, you uptight little bitch.”

Adrian’s eyes narrowed, his jaw clenching in anger, one hand curling into a tight fist. It was taking all the self-control he had to not just go ahead and punch Eddie in the face for that one. Instead, Adrian straightened up to his full height, and stalked over to the end of the queue, where he stood, glowering at Eddie from the corner of his eyes.

“I’ll let you pick the next one,” Eddie said, sauntering up next to Adrian, a triumphant grin on his face. “And don’t worry about your pretty little ass. Just sit back and enjoy the ride.”

A quarter of an hour later, that grin had turned into a pained grimace as he was sitting next to Adrian in a swan-shaped boat. A pink, swan-shaped boat. Which was on its way into the tunnel of love, red hearts blinking in the darkness almost like demons’ eyes.

Adrian’s smug little smile was no less infernal. The bastard was enjoying every second of this, Eddie thought with a scowl.

“Don’t worry about your pretty little ass,” Adrian cooed, barely able to hide the chuckle from his voice. “Just sit back and enjoy the ride…”


End file.
